ReviewI have loved everything Cat Stevens did although all my favourites come from the classics of the Tea For The Tillerman, Teaser & The Firecat etc. I was so disappointed when he let us all down by supporting the Fatwa on Salman Rushdie but I was also so pleased to hear that he was coming back from the deep hole of newly converted dogma.
I started playing this album and very soon fell in love with it. I can have it on constant repeat in the car on a 5 hour journey and never tire of it. I love the reworked classic of "I Think I See The Light" but perhaps my favourite is the first track which takes a high moralistic tone and also (let's face it) the point of view of an old man "I avoid the city after dark". We know that he's a little bit scared but also a little bit not happy with the idea of mixing with people having a good time, having a laugh and drinking too much.
"In the end" is the song that tells us that we'll all be judged at some stage so we had better treat people well while we're on this earth. "You can't bargain with the truth..." a message for Donald Trump & Boris Johnson. Like they're going to be listening to Cat Stevens! ;-)
It's also good that he moves away from his own songs and performs the massive Animals hit (don't forget Nina Simone too) "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood". There really isn't a bad track on this album so if anyone else doesn't like it, I recommend persevering with it. It just keeps on getting better, the more you play it.
His voice is just the same Cat Stevens that I always loved, his musicians (Alun Davies, Maartin Allcock, Danny Thompson etc.) and arrangements are top-hole just as they always were and apart from a slightly dreamy prayer-like track, it's rivetting from start to finish. I bought my copy second-hand and it's the best fiver's worth I ever had!
ReviewAfter having played Cat Stevens records from the mid 1960's through to the late 1970's., I thought I would give this a spin and bought it second hand. His output in the early 1970's was excellent - quite a different direction from his 1960's pop records which were very good at the time. The quality started to take a bit of a nose dive after his 1973 album "Foreigner". It was evident that he was disillusioned with the "Rock Star" process, and his output reflected this.
This album has no redeeming features as far as I'm concerned, even the reworking of "I think I see the light" from the excellent 1970 "Mona Bone Jakon" album is very poor by comparison. Perhaps he should have stayed in retirement